Are Mashups the End of Music Genres As We Know Them?
>> MIKE: Here’s an idea: The mashup is putting an end to music genres as we know them theme So you probably never expected to hear Lil’ John singing alongside Stephanie from Lazy Town. Or Justin Bieber with Lamb of God. But these are exactly the kind of musical shenanigans made possible by the mashup. Largely built upon the concept of juxtaposition, the mashup takes bits of two, three, many different songs of different styles and mashes them... up. windchimes One of the reasons we find the mashup so entertaining is that it transgresses the boundaries of what we normally think of as musically appropriate. Ladylike vocals with a heavy metal baseline. A Chopin prelude with some Radiohead snare drum. And Usher combined with... a cat. We have this cultural expectation built on genre that certain types of music can’t go together because they’re too stylistically different. And it’s when those genre based expectations are messed with that we’re like, “OMG mashup, you so crazy.” But when really give it a good brain think, you realize that genre is sort of a house of cards to begin with. Boop. Sure, classifying something as jazz is more useful than classifying something as music, but not that much more useful. Jazz can mean Duke Ellington just as much as it can mean Derek Bailey. And saying you listen to pop music is like saying you drink liquids or wear fabrics. Ergo the number of subclassifications within these genres just continues to grow and grow and grow. Is it dubstep or brostep or psytrance or trancey-steppy-steppy-dub-trace-core? I have no idea. And it’s not just this way with music either, oh, no, no. wha? Are performance art and contemporary dance that different? And where’s the line between Sci-Fi writing and magical realism? We’re at this point of such extreme cultural cross pollination we’re essentially permuting combinations of every genre in each artform. Which makes the act of pigeon holing works into genres increasingly difficult. And increasingly unhelpful. Which leads us to ask, “Hey, genre, what are you good at?” Well, turns out genre is great at selling. Genre designations influence what people listen to, what they read, what movies they go see, what they do and do not spend their money on a ton. But maybe even more so than selling, genre is great at defining communities. ding Anyone who has been to middle school knows that there is a huge culture of self identification aided by music genre. Punk, hip hop and metal say much more about people than they do about music. Cultural sociologist Jennifer Lena explains that musical genres describe a system of orientations, expectation and conventions that bind together industry, performers, critics and fans in making what they identify as a distinctive sort of music. Which might provide a little insight into why even though so many fans feel comforted by it, so many musicians find genre designations arbitrary and limiting. Legendary country musician Waylon Jennings said, “I’ve always felt that blues, rock an’ roll and country are just about a beat apart.” The mashup acknowledges that this is totally the case. It is postclassification and genre. And who knows, the mashup might even announce the arrival of a media epoch where you can transgress not only genre designations but also the cultural ones. Let’s say you’re a diehard Biggie fan but you have a soft spot in your heart for, oh, I don’t know, Miley Cyrus. Mashups totally know that feel, bro. Mashups are the practical expression of the ideal that metalheads, gangstas, electronerds, pop... tarts We’re all just like one big musical family dude, bro. And sure, we’ll probably always have distinct labels for musical styles. But it stands to reason that if you can do this: Queen - We Will Rock You/Outkast - Hey Ya The distinctions probably don’t mean a whole hell of a lot. What do you guys think? Does genre matter anymore? Let us know in the comments and also, we got you this: chirp We would love it if you opened it. Clicking opens it. Please subscribe. Galleries vs. the internet, who won? Let’s see what you guys had to say: 182crazyK says that it doesn’t really matter you experience art, but just that you’ve had an experience. dakotagonz makes a very valid point that physical media will always be around. And while that might mostly be true, VHS tapes are definitely gone. Art curator dubldeka talks about the relationship between the internet gallery and the real gallery and says that people will go to the real thing to view the lumpy stuff. We agree, RabidEasterBunny, it is very hard to find virtual needles in virtual haystacks. A lot of people pointed out that in addition to niche internet art galleries, there’s also deviantART, which is huge and open to everybody and pretty awesome. halcyonacoustic and joshuacorkhum point out that internet galleries and meet space aren’t actually mutually exclusive. No lie, that is actually my bathrobe. remaster95 points out that in addition to being a place where you can see art, the internet is also a place where you can collaborate with other artists. That is not how it works RazyMo- ah, son of a- theme Category:English Category:Complete